News & Analysis

Los Angeles-Long Beach is moving slowly toward a dual system of drayage in which some drivers are becoming unionized employees, while others prefer to remain independent contractors. Eventually, the result could be a sufficient pool of drivers to serve the 13 container terminals in the largest U.S. port complex, resulting in service and pricing consistency for the shippers that depend on harbor drivers.

A recently-launched Federal Maritime Commission Section 15 investigation of a terminal operators discussion agreement could have a chilling effect on the mandatory inspection of chassis by International Longshore and Warehouse Union mechanics at West Coast ports.

Drivers for the Southern California drayage company Eco Flow voted this week to join the Teamsters Union. This development is not a surprise because Eco Flow was formed on the employee-driver model, but it is nevertheless a victory by the union in its attempt to organize drayage companies across the country.

Chassis leasing companies and California truckers are asking federal agencies to act quickly to prevent what they say are illegal chassis inspections by the International Longshore and Warehouse Union at U.S. West Coast ports.

Harbor drayage companies on the U.S. West Coast feared that a provision in the new International Longshore and Warehouse Union contract mandating longshore inspections of chassis would cause uncertainty and delays for truckers, but they didn’t imagine that it would happen so quickly.

If harbor trucking companies and marine terminal operators hope to survive in the cutthroat port environment, their numbers must be reduced. The industry needs fewer, larger, better-capitalized companies, according to a Southern California trucking executive.

If marine terminal operators had their way, the days of individual truckers entering their facilities in search of specific containers would be over, replaced by a model in which containers are peeled off the top of a stack and delivered to truckers without regard to consignee or destination.

The Harbor Trucking Association of Southern California has formed its own chassis pool to ensure its member companies will have access to the equipment they need even when terminals in Los Angeles-Long Beach are experiencing equipment shortages or dislocations.